How To Track a Band?

nightsblood · Post by **nightsblood** » Wed Nov 17, 2010 4:08 am

I'm splitting this off from Rockadelic's awesome thread. One thing mentioned therein is that people uploading rare old recordings could make more of an effort to contact the band and ask them if they have the rights to their music, and if so, would they mind if it gets posted online. Or go a step further and help them look for a reissue label. My question to those who have ran labels: how do you go about tracking down a band? I've seen several of you mention that it's pretty easy in this day and age. But if all you have to go on is a single with plain labels, or a copied demo tape with no band members of contact info included, how do you go about finding a member(s)?

Just asking out of curiosity b/c I thought it would be interesting. I've stumbled across a couple of band members online but purely by accident. I don't run a label and I hardly ever u/l anything (I guess that's one advantage of being a small fry collector- everyone's already heard all the stuff I own!

), but I still thought it'd be interesting to find out how folks do this.

Thanks for any insights

ION BRITTON · Post by **ION BRITTON** » Wed Nov 17, 2010 7:53 am

nightsblood, I'll tell you how I've done it so far: Simply by googling the names of band members with the use of another word that's related to the artist, for example "Tony Martin vocals", "Kevin Heybourne guitar" or "Robert Lowe Texas". Sometimes a lot of results appear and you gotta search them, but if you find anything that looks like an email or a home address or a myspace page and you suspect that it might be the one you're looking for, you give it a shot. It doesn't always work, but that's how I tracked most band members so far. On two occasions the members contacted me first because of a post in a forum that was related to them (one was through this forum and it was a guy from Crimson Tyger who was looking for their own demo).

doomedplanet · Post by **doomedplanet** » Wed Nov 17, 2010 8:30 am

Alan,
There are many ways to approach finding bands. A first step is metal Archives. Not always correct but a starting point. many times the entries list past and present members, so you have something to start with, including region of the country.

If you don't find them in M-A, you have other references, like reference books, old fanzines, etc. say the out of print HEADBANGERS book by Mark Hale, which isn't impossible to find used if you look around on used book search engines.

Another is the most obvious mentioned by Ion Britton: google, poke around there with keyword selections.

Another tool is the Library of Congress copyright database search engine, tons of data there.

And of course myspace which has tons of bands there, a useful tool, but of course all of the above lead to dead ends and sometimes you have some success.

And another is the oldest-school search engine, the phone book and the cold call. But you have to have a real stomach for that one sometimes!

And of course all of these many times lead to dead ends if you are looking for the total unknown. The deadest end I've found, was a tombstone burial entry at a archive for a cemetary.

Khnud · Post by **Khnud** » Wed Nov 17, 2010 8:37 am

Myspace is generally only valid if the band's still active in some way.

Metal Archives rarely lists band members of the more obscure acts, more often than not the band member section is blank.

Being born in the late 70's, I don't own any early 80's fanzines, and out of print American books are quite hard to come by in Sweden. I do know how to search for books online (being a librarian and all), but without pointers as to which reference works to look for, it's hard. Thanks for the tip though.

Library of Congress was a good suggestion, thanks for that!

American phone books aren't easily accessed here in Sweden.

So, in general, it's very hard for me to locate band members in quite unknown bands from another continent, who released a sole single in the early 80's or thereabouts. I think I'll leave this detective work to other people.

Glockose · Post by **Glockose** » Wed Nov 17, 2010 2:28 pm

Alan - Come by sometime, or give me a call and I will teach you.

Been doing this for 25+ years.

Used to have to go to the Libary and dig through phone books, make 1000 calls.

Now it's pretty easy.

Hit 4 last week..

Glockose · Post by **Glockose** » Wed Nov 17, 2010 2:41 pm

I have a qustion

Someone said they have been looking for the following

Lord Ryur - I found
Mistreater - I found

WHY?
You already know someone else has talked to the band.

Why do you want to?

Khnud · Post by **Khnud** » Wed Nov 17, 2010 2:44 pm

Interviews maybe?

ION BRITTON · Post by **ION BRITTON** » Wed Nov 17, 2010 2:54 pm

glockose wrote:I have a qustion

Someone said they have been looking for the following

Lord Ryur - I found
Mistreater - I found

WHY?
You already know someone else has talked to the band.

Why do you want to?

I don't want to talk to them as a label owner or a dealer, I want to talk to them as a fan. Aren't the rest allowed to find and talk to an unknown band if someone else has already done it?

Glockose · Post by **Glockose** » Wed Nov 17, 2010 3:00 pm

ION BRITTON wrote:
glockose wrote:I have a qustion

Someone said they have been looking for the following

Lord Ryur - I found
Mistreater - I found

WHY?
You already know someone else has talked to the band.

Why do you want to?
I don't want to talk to them as a label owner or a dealer, I want to talk to them as a fan. Aren't the rest allowed to find and talk to an unknown band if someone else has already done it?

Yes Sure, Whatever

I just dont understand.

I have found 1000's of USA bands and I will say 75% really did not want to talk about it that much.

Thats why OPM only had 16 releases instead of 100's
This is also why I was a little confused with some of the stuff from the other thread. These bands for the most part HATE there early music, Certanly if they are still making music. And they don't want anyone to ever hear that early stuff, Trust me I have tried for years with someof these folks and they would much rather keep it in there closet for life then to have someone hear it.

Glockose · Post by **Glockose** » Wed Nov 17, 2010 3:03 pm

I also guess that you would have no money invested in finding these folks doing it the way you said you have tried so then what the hell.

As I end up sometimes (really back in the day) having a lot of money invested by the time you talk to someone that you would really like to find something other then just talking to them.

But I guess for some that is just the way they think, a brush the greatness or something.. A FAN.. Fanatical. Stalker perhaps

nightsblood · Post by **nightsblood** » Wed Nov 17, 2010 3:03 pm

Interesting, thanks for the info guys! The copyright database is an interesting option. Again, I don't have plans to go looking for any bands, but it's interesting to learn how it's done.

John- I definitely need to come visit sometime. Maybe we can arrange a visit early next year, once the holidays are over and the Christmas bills are paid, but before taxes come due

Khnud · Post by **Khnud** » Wed Nov 17, 2010 3:18 pm

glockose wrote:I have found 1000's of USA bands and I will say 75% really did not want to talk about it that much.

Thats why OPM only had 16 releases instead of 100's
This is also why I was a little confused with some of the stuff from the other thread. These bands for the most part HATE there early music, Certanly if they are still making music. And they don't want anyone to ever hear that early stuff, Trust me I have tried for years with someof these folks and they would much rather keep it in there closet for life then to have someone hear it.

Ouch. That's really depressing.

Khnud · Post by **Khnud** » Wed Nov 17, 2010 4:53 pm

Sorry if I seem to be holding a monologue, but I'm really trying to understand the bigger picture here:

Ok, so ripping music and uploading it is bad, because it prevents a presumably interested label from re-releasing the music in the future. Ok, so I get that. The only way to make it right is to contact the band and ask their permission to share it, and also inform them that labels might be interested in re-releasing their material.

But, since it seems most bands hate their early music and would rather keep it in the closet than allowing people to hear it, they will probably refuse both labels and third parties asking to be allowed to upload the stuff. So, in reality, all of this music will disappear into the unknown, except to the few who actually have the records.

So what's the point? I mean, this really sounds like we should all let the 80's metal genre die by itself and start persuing other interests. Maybe it's just me needing to take my daily Prozac dose, but to me this whole endeavor sounds quite hopeless.

ION BRITTON · Post by **ION BRITTON** » Wed Nov 17, 2010 5:01 pm

Khnud wrote: But, since it seems most bands hate their early music and would rather keep it in the closet than allowing people to hear it, they will probably refuse both labels and third parties asking to be allowed to upload the stuff. So, in reality, all of this music will disappear into the unknown, except to the few who actually have the records.

So what's the point? I mean, this really sounds like we should all let the 80's metal genre die by itself and start persuing other interests. Maybe it's just me needing to take my daily Prozac dose, but to me this whole endeavor sounds quite hopeless.

The exact same question I posed in the previous thread.

Glockose · Post by **Glockose** » Wed Nov 17, 2010 5:06 pm

Khnud wrote: So what's the point? I mean, this really sounds like we should all let the 80's metal genre die by itself and start persuing other interests. Maybe it's just me needing to take my daily Prozac dose, but to me this whole endeavor sounds quite hopeless.

For me I think there is enough WILLING parties and Music available to last a life time. That I don't NEED everything that was ever recorded to keep me happy.

In the past 7 days I have heard at least 6 bands from the 80's that I had never heard before, Without downloading anything..